Sally-Anne Perks and the Siege of Troy
by Qoheleth
Summary: Or, "Reading the (Great) Books, Part I". Because there are more important things in this world than changing history.
1. The Seven Assembled

**Disclaimer:** The _Harry Potter_ series is the formal property of Scholastic, Inc., while the seven books in the Come-and-Go Room are the acknowledged common patrimony of mankind. (Not that I'm not sure Scholastic wouldn't love to claim ownership of them, too, if it thought it could get away with it.)

* * *

"All right, everyone," said Winifred Willkie, clapping her hands with an air of prefectural decision. "It's three minutes till lights-out; time for everyone to be getting to bed."

There was a predictable chorus of protest from the newly inducted Hufflepuff first years, in which Sally-Anne Perks joined with particular fervour, but Willkie, though gentle, was firm. "Protest all you like now," she said, "but, when classes start tomorrow morning, you'll be grateful to have got a good night's sleep. Come on, now; boys to the left, girls to the right."

* * *

 _A good night's sleep,_ Sally-Anne thought wryly, as she lay, a few minutes later, in the darkened girls' bedchamber. _Is she mad? How can she expect anyone to get a good night's sleep, her first night at Hogwarts?_ For Sally-Anne had fantasised about this day since she was old enough to know what magic meant, and, now that it had come, felt less inclined to fall asleep than she could ever remember feeling before.

She lay for a few minutes on her back, gazing up at the ceiling and wondering how many hundreds of other girls had gazed at that same spot before her. Then, when she realised how little this was settling her, she tried rolling over and shutting her eyes – but that only made her all the more conscious of the thousand tiny sounds about her: the creaking of the ancient walls, the patter of house-elves' feet in the corridors, the faint cries of strange beasts echoing from the forest outside… no, that didn't help at all.

As a last resort, she tried her old trick of reciting the times tables to herself. Twice one was two; twice two was four; twice three… did they teach maths at Hogwarts?… twice four was eight; twice five… no, probably not, or she would have had to pick up a slide rule along with her cauldron and wand… twice six… but, then again, maybe the maths professor didn't believe in slide rules…

So she continued unprofitably on as the minutes whiled by – ten, eleven, twelve of them. And then, just as the grandfather clock in the common room was striking the quarter-hour, and Sally-Anne was trying to remember what nine times seven was, something happened that would dramatically alter the remainder of her life – and those of several others, as well.

* * *

"Oof!"

It wasn't a very long fall, and the soft carpeting into which she tumbled nicely cushioned what little impact there was, but Sally-Anne nonetheless let out a cry of surprise as her small body struck the floor. She was vaguely aware that hers wasn't the only cry – that two or three other voices, including at least one boy's, had let out similar exclamations more or less in harmony with her – but, in her surprise and puzzlement, she ignored this at first.

Where had the bed gone? Had she been so restless that she had fallen out of bed without knowing it? No, surely not; she had been nowhere near the edge – and, besides, she was quite sure that the dormitory floor hadn't been carpeted. And what was the light doing on?

She raised her head and looked around, and her bewilderment only increased. She seemed to be lying on the floor of a small, brightly lit room, unfurnished except for six small cushions, a tall, high-backed chair lined in red velvet, and a matching table next to it on which stood a pile of thick, leather-bound books. Standing in front of the chair, blinking quizzically, were two of the teachers she had seen at the staff table during the feast – an elderly witch with white hair and coke-bottle spectacles, and a younger one with rosy cheeks and a curvy, cozy-looking figure. And scattered along the floor between the chair and the cushions, looking just as baffled as Sally-Anne felt, were two other girls and a boy – all of whom seemed to be first years like herself, and none of whom she recognised from the Hufflepuff table.

"What's going on?" said the nearer of the girls, her dark hair dancing about her shoulders as she sat up and looked sharply around. "What happened to the common room?"

"Got me," the boy muttered, rising up onto his elbow with a soft groan. "Probably it's one of those hazings Aaron warned me about. I thought those third-year twins looked like trouble…"

The elderly witch chuckled audibly at this, prompting her rosy-cheeked companion to shoot her a sharp look. "No," she said. "I think I can spare you that worry, Mr… Moon, is it?"

The boy nodded. "Calum Moon," he said. "Aaron is my brother."

"Yes, I thought I saw the resemblance," the old lady said. "And you know me, of course, since I'm sure Aaron's told you about queer old Professor Sinistra, who's always ragging him about having such a fine surname and such poor Astronomy marks. But, as I was saying, I don't think you need suspect the Weasley twins in this matter. I've spent two years now observing their hijinks, and I think I can say with some confidence that, if bringing us here were their doing, this room would not be nearly so quiet as it is."

"Then who _did_ bring us here?" said the farther girl, in a voice that seemed to demand immediate and straightforward answers of everything in the universe. "And where _is_ here, anyway? I'm Mandy Brocklehurst, by the way," she added in the same breath.

"Are you, now?" said Professor Sinistra. "Well, Miss Brocklehurst, of course it would delight me to be able to answer your question; that is what I do for a living, after all. To do so properly, however, I must have information on the subject, and I'm afraid I have no more idea of where to find such information than you. Has anyone any suggestions?"

As the four first years glanced at each other helplessly, a dry cough sounded in the air just behind Sally-Anne's head. "Only one, Gudrun," said a thin, wheezing voice. "Perhaps the note atop that stack of books might prove to be of some assistance."

Sally-Anne turned to locate the speaker, and then started back and yelped involuntarily – for, floating about a foot above her, where she hadn't thought to look in her earlier survey of the room, was the ghost of a plump, balding wizard in the sort of robes that her great-grandfather might have worn as a boy.

A moment later, she recovered herself and blushed hotly. _Stupid, Sally-Anne,_ she thought. _What kind of Hogwarts student are you, getting scared by a ghost?_ She mumbled an apology – which the ghost, however, seemed not to hear, any more than he seemed to have noticed her original reaction. (Indeed, judging by his expression, she imagined that he didn't make much of a habit of noticing things in general.) Insofar as his attention was directed at anyone, it appeared to be Professor Sinistra – who, in her turn, was occupied with reaching up to the top of the stack of books (which, because of the height of the table, the thickness of the volumes, and Sinistra's distinct stoop, lay just above her eye level) and withdrawing a yellowed piece of parchment covered with ornate handwriting. "Hmm, yes, so it might," she said. "Thank you, Herodotus. It's lucky you were floating there, or we might never have noticed it." She grimaced wryly. "The joys of being short, eh, Charity?"

The rosy-cheeked witch – who was, indeed, quite petite – coloured and shrugged. "Oh, I'm sure we would have found it eventually," she said. "Sooner or later, it would have occurred to one of us to start taking those books down to examine, and we could hardly have missed it then."

"Well, perhaps so," said Professor Sinistra. "Anyway, let's see what we have here." She adjusted her spectacles, coughed daintily, and began to read aloud:

" _To Whom It May Concern:_

 _"I write these words from a crystal chamber in a castle of iron, through which flow all the memories and echoes that magic has left upon the Earth. At one time – some three thousand years ago, as I must now reckon – I was the History of Magic master at Hogwarts School; then, on 28 June 1843, while consulting a certain reference in the school library, I carelessly ruptured the barrier between time and eternity, and found myself cast forward into the year A.D. 5000._

 _"In this age, the school where I once taught no longer exists; in its place stands a vast fortress, peopled with august figures that seem to be neither wizard nor Muggle. These, upon discovering what I was, directed me to this chamber, which they speak of as the Cell of Always, that I might see by its virtue what had transpired on the Earth betwixt my time and theirs._

 _"I dare not speak plainly of the things I have learned, to you in whose future these things yet lie – for history is remorseless in defending her integrity, and men have been destroyed ere now through fear of what is to come. Yet I may say that I was grieved to see what had become of my people, and of wizarding folk throughout the Earth, through their single-minded concern with increasing their natural powers, to the neglect of wisdom and of the cultivation of virtue. And so, recalling the ancient spell by which a Hogwarts teacher may send seven books across the æons and summon denizens of Hogwarts to read them, I determined to make use of it, that at least some handful of young wizards and witches might become acquainted with the good that has rightly been called liberal._

 _"Thus, beginning on the first day of term in the year 1991, the Come-and-Go Room shall draw seven souls into itself regularly after school hours – to wit, the then professors of Astronomy, History of Magic, and the course in Muggle Studies instituted sixty years after my expulsion, as well as one pure-blooded first-year student arbitrarily selected from each House. These seven shall find waiting for them seven illustrious works of Muggle literature, which they are to read, in installments, over the course of the students' seven years at school. When the end of an evening's installment has been reached, they shall be returned to those places whence they came, no smallest moment of time having elapsed; until the installment is read, there shall be for them no returning. Thus do I command, by the power that is in me as successor to Rowena Ravenclaw, and thus shall it assuredly be._

 _"God speed you, my colleagues, and you my pupils that might have been. May your hearts be moved, your minds nourished, and your souls enlightened through your commerce with the wisdom of the ages; so may I rest easy in this latter-day soil, which has so long awaited my humble bones. Till that day, I remain,_

 _"Yours most sincerely,_

 _"Prof. Vortigern Adley  
_ _History of Magic  
_ _1818-1843"_

* * *

When Professor Sinistra had finished reading, there was a long moment's silence as she and her six companions considered this remarkable missive. To Sally-Anne, the picture it had drawn seemed horrifying, almost blasphemous: a world without Hogwarts? A world where magic had ceased to operate through spells and wizardry? Even in the 50th Century, how could they stand it?

The ghost's wheezing voice broke in on her childish thoughts. "So that's what happened to old Adley," he said. "I remember hearing about him when I first came to Hogwarts as a boy in '76; back then, his disappearance was still one of the great unsolved mysteries of the school."

"'76?" Mandy Brocklehurst repeated, staring at him. "You have to be older than that. My parents had both graduated by '76. Or are you a time traveller, too?"

"He means _Eighteen_ -Seventy-Six, Miss Brocklehurst," said Professor Sinistra mildly.

"Naturally," said the ghost. "Of course, by the time I joined the faculty, everyone who had worked with Adley had long since retired or died, so his mystery was less vivid in people's minds – and, this being Hogwarts, of course there were plenty of more recent enigmas competing with it for attention. I don't believe I've so much as heard his name in a hundred years."

"And so now he just suddenly appears again out of nowhere," said the dark-haired girl, "and whisks us out of our beds and tells us that we have to read a bunch of stupid old Muggle books? Where does he get off?" Her tone was one not uncommon among children of privilege suddenly imposed upon; it suggested self-absorbed panic disguising itself as moral outrage. "I say one of you grown-ups curse the door off its hinges, and we all go back to our dormitories and forget the whole thing."

Calum Moon gave her a long, low look that brimmed with scorn, and Sally-Anne, thinking he was about to start a quarrel (which she couldn't bear to see, on her first day at Hogwarts), inflated her lungs to intervene. But that turned out to be unnecessary, because all he said was, " _What_ door?"

And this, when everyone looked around, proved to be a fair point. Not only were the walls of the room they were in solid and perfectly smooth, but they had a tendency (as the rosy-cheeked witch discovered when she tried to feel them) to recede as one approached them – without, curiously, making the room seem any larger. It was plain that Professor Adley, however clumsily he might have handled the barrier between time and eternity, knew quite well how to design a room that would keep two women, four children, and a ghost securely inside it until he wished otherwise.

Once this was clear to everyone – even the dark-haired girl – Professor Sinistra popped her lips thoughtfully. "Well," she said, "as we seem doomed to be weekly companions for some time to come, it seems to me that we ought to acquire some idea of who we all are. I, as you have heard, am your new Astronomy teacher, Professor Sinistra; the gentleman floating above you is Professor Binns, who has succeeded our remarkable host as History of Magic teacher; and this charming creature –" (she indicated the rosy-cheeked witch, who had returned from her fruitless quest for the wall and was now inspecting the seven books with a satisfied smile) "– is Professor Burbage, of the Muggle Studies course that some or all of you may begin taking in your third year."

" _I_ won't," the dark-haired girl muttered.

Professor Sinistra shot a glance at her that Sally-Anne couldn't quite read, and then continued. "As for the four of you," she said, "Mr Moon and Miss Brocklehurst have already introduced themselves; they didn't specify which Houses they represented, but I seem to recall Miss Brocklehurst being Sorted into Ravenclaw – and presumably it was at the Gryffindor table that Mr Moon made the acquaintance of the Weasley twins. But that still, most regrettably, leaves two strangers in our midst." And she glanced enquiringly at Sally-Anne and the dark-haired girl.

Seeing that the latter showed no particular anxiety to volunteer her name, Sally-Anne rose to her knees, cleared her throat, and ran a nervous hand through the tangled mess that her tossings and turnings in bed had made of her hair. As she did so, it was borne in upon her (what had hitherto, in the general strangeness of things, quite escaped her notice) that she had been transported to this Come-and-Go Room in precisely the same state as she had been lying in bed – which meant that she was kneeling in a room full of strangers, half of them teachers and none of the other half her Housemates, while wearing a pink nightie with Nora Niffler embroidered across the front. The sudden shock of embarrassment almost rendered her mute; it took a couple deep swallows before she was able to come out with, "Sally-Anne Perks, Hufflepuff."

Professor Sinistra bobbed her head. "A pleasure, Miss Perks. And you, my dear?"

"Morag MacDougal," the dark-haired girl said sullenly.

"House?" said Professor Sinistra.

Morag gave her a quizzical look. "Isn't it obvious?" she said. "It's the only one left."

"Yes, but I'd prefer you to identify it, all the same," said Professor Sinistra. "It happens to have been my own House, and I dislike seeing its residents shy about naming it."

This remark seemed to touch a nerve in the young Scotswitch; her elegant nostrils flared, and she lifted her chin and said distinctly, "Slytherin."

"Thank you." And Professor Sinistra clapped her hands together. "Well, now that that's established, I suppose we ought to see about these books. That's your department, Charity; what do you say?"

"Oh, they're lovely," said Professor Burbage with a grin. "I think I would have liked this fellow Adley. To be sure, one or two of the titles aren't quite what I'd have picked for those slots, but they're all excellent pieces of…"

"Well, that's good to know," said Professor Sinistra. "So, then, will you be entertaining us with the first installment, or shall we give that honour to one of these charming youngsters?"

"Hmm?" Professor Burbage blinked. "Oh. Oh, I see, yes. Um…" She turned and examined the four students, tapping her forefinger thoughtfully against her upper lip as she did so; then she pointed at Sally-Anne and smiled. "How about you, Miss Perks? You've quite a pretty voice, and we haven't heard very much of it tonight."

Sally-Anne blushed. "Well… all right, I suppose."

"Excellent," said Professor Sinistra. "Up here, then, dear." She indicated the great chair, and Sally-Anne rose to her feet, came forward, and, with the assistance of the two corporeal professors, clambered up awkwardly into the seat. Then Professor Burbage handed her the topmost of the seven books, and, as everyone settled down upon (or, in Professor Binns's case, just above) the cushions, she ran her fingers over its gold-embossed cover, opened it with a sense of reverence, and delightedly breathed in the ink-and-paper odour of the opening pages.

Professor Sinistra cleared her throat softly. "Whenever you're ready, Miss Perks."

"Oh," said Sally-Anne, and coloured faintly again. "Sorry." She glanced down at the title page, cleared her throat, and read aloud: " **The Iliad of Homer, translated from the Greek by Samuel Butler.** "


	2. An Epic Begins

"What's an iliad?" said Calum.

Mandy shot him an aggrieved look. "Just listen, Moon," she said. "They'll tell us what an iliad is, if you're patient. It's the title of the book, after all, so it must be important in the story."

Professor Burbage coughed. "Actually, Miss Brocklehurst," she said, "while that's a sensible approach to take with books in general, this doesn't happen to be that sort of title. It's a description of the book itself; it means that it's a story about the city of Ilium. That's why it's 'the Iliad of Homer', not 'the Iliad, by Homer', you see."

Calum shot Mandy a triumphant look, and the little Ravenclaw flushed. "Oh," she murmured. "Okay, I guess. I just never heard of naming a book that way. And I didn't know there was a city called Ilium; it wasn't in my atlas at home, I'm sure of that. Where is it, in Greece?"

"Just listen, Brocklehurst," said Calum, in exact mimicry of her own repressive tone. "They'll tell us where it is, if you're patient; it's the topic of the book, after all."

Mandy opened and closed her mouth a few times without getting any words out, and Professor Sinistra decided to intervene. "Well, no, not necessarily," she said. "After all, if one of you wrote a book about London, you wouldn't necessarily specify that it was in England; you'd expect people to know. This Homer may have done the same thing, if he lived in a time and place when everyone knew where Ilium was." She turned to her colleague with a look of wide-eyed expectancy. "So tell us, Charity: _is_ it in Greece?"

Professor Burbage hesitated. "Well… in a sense, yes," she said. "That is, it isn't anywhere anymore, but the ruins of it are on Greek soil – or Turkish, I think, actually, but it's the part of Turkey that really ought to be part of Greece. But you shouldn't think of it as a Greek city while you're reading this book, because the whole point of the story is that Ilium is its own nation, with its own king and language and so on, and the Greeks are fighting a war with it."

"Why?" said Calum.

Professor Burbage smiled. "Well, that you _will_ find out if we keep reading," she said. "Which I think we should do, now. Miss Perks, if you please?"

Sally-Anne nodded, and flipped through a couple blank pages to the place where the text began. " **Book One,** " she read. " **Sing, O goddess, the** …"

"It could have been anonymous, you know, Moon," said Mandy.

Sally-Anne blinked, stopped reading, and looked up to see the rest of her listeners looking as confused as she felt. "How's that, Miss Brocklehurst?" said Professor Sinistra.

"Isn't that the word?" said Mandy. "Anonymous? You know, when nobody knows who wrote something. It could have been an anonymous book about a man called Homer who had an iliad, or an iliad who lived in a place called Homer, or something like that. Then 'The Iliad of Homer' would have all been the title, and it _would_ have described the story rather than the book. So I wasn't stupid to say what I did about waiting, Calum Moon," she finished, glaring at the young Gryffindor next to her.

"Who said you were?" said Calum innocently.

Mandy stared at him for a long moment, then made a scrunched-up face at him and turned sharply away, folding her arms and fixing her eyes pointedly on Sally-Anne in the tall chair.

Professor Sinistra sighed, and gestured. "Miss Perks?"

"Yes, ma'am," said Sally-Anne, and turned to the book again. " **Sing, O goddess, the anger of Achilles, son** …"

"'A-kill-ease'," said Professor Burbage.

Sally-Anne looked up. "Huh?"

"It's pronounced 'a-kill-ease', not 'a-chills'," said Professor Burbage. "CH in Greek always makes a _kuh_ sound, and you have to pronounce all the vowels." Then, seeing a look of panic come into Sally-Anne's eyes, she smiled reassuringly and added, "Don't worry about it, darling. Just do your best, and we'll help you if you need it. Won't we, Herodotus?" she added, with a glance at the ghost.

"Mm?" said Professor Binns. "Oh. Oh, yes, rather. Of course. Naturally."

Professor Burbage seemed less than satisfied by this response, and turned plaintively to Professor Sinistra, who nodded firmly. "Certainly, Charity," she said. "I've spent thirty-nine years teaching young wizards to pronounce the names of stars; if 'Xi Ursae Majoris' isn't beyond my capacities, I don't see why 'Achilles' should be."

"You're a good woman, Gudrun," said Professor Burbage with a smile.

"Pshaw," said Professor Sinistra. "You just say that because you didn't know me in the '20s."

A low groan emerged from the cushion on the far left, across which Morag was sprawling morosely like an eleven-year-old tragedy queen. "Oh, Merlin's bogies," she said. "Perks, can't you just read the thing and not worry about pronouncing the names right? If everyone keeps getting distracted like this, we'll be stuck in this stupid room all week."

For a moment, an awkward silence threatened to fall, but Professor Binns's native pedantry came to the rescue. "Hardly that, Miss MacKinnon," he said. "Adley's note, if you'll recall, specified that no time would elapse during our sessions here. To be sure, it may be the equivalent of a week so far as our consciousnesses are concerned, but to speak of it as though the normal, bodily effects of time will in any way inconvenience you is surely a misapprehension."

Morag pursed her lips, and took a deep breath. "Yes, sir," she said. "But you see, my consciousness doesn't want to spend a week here any more than my body does."

"Ah," said Professor Binns. "Well, that's reasonable enough, of course. Yes, by all means, carry on, Miss Perry." He waved his ectoplasmic hand with airy magnanimity, and Sally-Anne, despite her self-consciousness and discomfort over the recent tension, couldn't help but giggle.

"Yes, sir," she said. "You said it was _a-kill-ease_ , Professor?"

Professor Burbage nodded.

"Okay," said Sally-Anne. " **Sing, O goddess, the anger of** _ **A-chill-es**_ **, son of Peleus, that brought countless ills upon the Achaeans.** " She enunciated "Peleus" without any especial trouble, but "Achaeans" required more care; she sounded it out slowly, phoneme by phoneme, and checked for Professor Burbage's confirmatory nod before continuing. " **Many a brave soul did it send hurrying down to Hades, and many a hero did it yield a prey to dogs and vultures, for so were the counsels of Zeus fulfilled from the day on which the son of Atreus, king of men, and great Achilles first fell out with one another.** "

"Oh, lovely," said Morag. "Just the sort of bedtime story I was hoping for tonight."

"Sh!" said Mandy, glaring at her. (Morag met the glare with an icy one of her own, and then sighed and dropped her head down onto her cushion again.)

"What's Hades?" Calum wanted to know. "The grave?"

"More or less," said Professor Burbage. "Hades was the name of the god who the ancient Greeks thought ruled all the underground world; because dead people were buried in the ground, it was thought that their souls were in Hades's care, and so dying meant going to him. He was the brother, by the way," she added, "of that Zeus whose counsels were fulfilled when all the heroes died. Zeus was the ruler of the sky and air, and therefore of everything that lived on land, including men and women; that made him the most important of the gods, and all the others honoured him as their king."

Calum wrinkled his nose. "So the head god wanted a bunch of heroes to die and get eaten by vultures?" he said. "Sounds a pretty nasty piece of work to me."

Professor Burbage chewed her lip thoughtfully. "I'm not sure that's the right way to take it," she said. "'Counsels' doesn't really mean wishes or desires; it's more like judgments, or rulings. And the judgments of Zeus, in this sort of a connection, would be another way of talking about the fundamental laws that govern human life – such as, in this case, the law that people who are foolish and quarrelsome bring unhappiness to themselves and everyone around them. I think that's what Homer means here; in fact, he has Zeus himself say something very much like that, in a famous scene in his other great poem."

"Oh," said Calum. "Well, that's better, then, I guess."

"I agree," said Professor Burbage. "And now, Miss Perks, please go on."

But Sally-Anne, instead of going on, looked up from the page with an expression of concerned puzzlement. "Other poem?" she said. "How do you mean _other poem_ , Professor?"

"It's called the Odyssey," said Professor Burbage. "There's a character you'll meet in this book called Odysseus, and Homer, after he finished this, wrote another story about him trying to get back home after…"

But Sally-Anne shook her head. "No, ma'am, that's not what I mean," she said. "I mean, if you call the Odyssey his other great poem, doesn't that mean that this Iliad is one of his great poems?"

"Certainly."

"But it isn't," said Sally-Anne. "It's not a poem at all. Poems have a kind of rhythm when you read them, and you start a new line on the page when you've gotten to the word that rhymes. This isn't written like that at all; it's just like a normal story-book, where it goes as though the person were just talking to you."

"Prose," said Professor Burbage.

"What?"

"When someone writes that way, it's called prose," said Professor Burbage. "And, yes, you're right that the book you're reading is written that way. But remember that it's a translation. The original Iliad does have a rhythm when you read it – though it doesn't have rhymes, I don't think – but it's written in ancient Greek, and people like us, who don't speak that, have to have someone turn it into English before we can read it. And it's very hard to make the different words that you have to use in English have the same rhythm as the original words did, so Mr Butler evidently didn't try; he just turned it into the best prose he could, and hoped it would give the right idea. You see?"

Sally-Anne nodded, but there was a slight frown on her face as she turned back to the book. She liked poems, and it distressed her to think that she should have been reading one, but couldn't because she didn't know enough. Some time, she supposed, she would have to learn Greek, if the Hogwarts class schedule gave her time – enough, at least, to read this Iliad book properly.

" **And which of the gods was it that set them on to quarrel?** " she read. " **It was the son of Zeus and Leto; for he was angry with the king and sent a pestilence upon the host to plague the people, because the son of Atreus had dishonoured Chryses, his priest.** Did I get that right?" she added. "Cry-seas?"

"Sounds all right to me," said Professor Sinistra. "Anyway, keep… oh, good heavens. Yes, Mr Moon, what is it now?"

"Oh, nothing," said Calum, lowering his hand. "I was just wondering about that 'son of Zeus and Leto' bit. Doesn't that god have his own name?"

"Yes, he does," said Professor Burbage. "His name is Apollo; he was the god of the sun, of prophecy, of medicine, and of poetry. And the son of Atreus has a name, too – rather an impressive one, in fact: Agamemnon." She sounded out the four syllables distinctly, and with evident relish. "But Homer often liked to identify people and places by elaborate descriptions, rather than just by their names. It was one of his tricks to make the rhythm work out," (she winked at Sally-Anne) "and to make the whole thing sound more elegant and impressive. You'll get used to it, if you give it time."

"Fine by me," said Calum. "So did Zeus and his wife only have one son, or did the others just not get to be gods?"

Professor Burbage blinked. "I'm sorry?"

"Well, if you can call the god just 'the son of Zeus and Leto', and have everyone automatically know who he is…"

"Oh." Professor Burbage blushed. "Yes. Um, yes, I see what you mean. But you have to understand… that is, it isn't… I mean…"

"I'll take this one, Charity," said Professor Sinistra, and turned to Calum with the air of one getting an unpleasant duty over with. "No, Mr Moon, Jupiter – or Zeus, I should say – had a great many sons, several of whom became gods. But just because they were his sons didn't mean they were always his wife's sons. Jupiter had an unfortunate habit, I'm afraid, of running off with other ladies and… ah… treating them, let us say, as if they were his wife, at least as far as babies were concerned. It wasn't a very godly or kingly thing of him to do, but there you are."

This evidently meant very little to Calum – or, apparently, to Mandy either. Sally-Anne, however, felt her cheeks get hot, and squirmed uncomfortably in her seat; her mother, the evening before, had gone into some detail about what might happen to her body while she was at school, what it would mean, and what she ought to do about it, so she had a pretty good idea what Professor Sinistra was referring to. Morag, meanwhile, seemed to have an even better one; at any rate, there was the mark of specific knowledge in the jerk with which she raised her head, the indignant gape that held her mouth speechlessly open for two full seconds, and the fiercely contemptuous tone with which she finally said, "They worshipped someone like _that_?"

Professor Burbage looked vaguely ill. "No, Miss MacDougal," she said. "Not in the way you're thinking of. It's just that different people all over Greece told all sorts of different stories about their gods – sometimes because they really believed them, but quite as often merely to make a point or to amuse themselves – and, because there was no-one to say which stories were true and which weren't, they all got mixed together into the background of the Greek religion. But when people were actually worshipping Zeus, I'm sure they weren't thinking of him as an adulterer or a seducer; in fact, when in later days a great philosopher arose who was really concerned about what the gods actually were, he rejected all those stories as wicked and inappropriate, and got very upset with the poets for propagating them."

"Then why aren't we reading _his_ book?" Morag demanded. "If he knows what he's talking about, and this Homer Muggle doesn't, why is Adley making us waste our time listening to all this rot about Leto or whoever?"

"Because you can't just always listen to the clever people!" Mandy exclaimed before Professor Burbage could respond. "If you do, you get cut off from the things ordinary people know and feel, and you end up just being clever about cleverness, not about anything real. My dad's always saying that; it's why he made me promise not to just make friends in my own House."

Professor Sinistra turned and smiled at her. "Well said, Miss Brocklehurst," she said. "As soon as we get out of this time bubble, I must remember to award a point or two to Ravenclaw for that."

Mandy blushed, and grinned. "Well, thanks, Professor."

"Of course," Professor Sinistra added, "I'll then have to take them off again for making unladylike faces at Mr Moon earlier. Still, you're breaking even – which is more than I can say for certain young witches who soil their mouths with remarks about the Lord Merlin's nasal excreta." And she turned pointedly to Morag, who, somewhat to the surprise of her fellow students, turned red and murmured a sheepish and apparently sincere apology.

"I'm just tired, that's all," she said. "It's my first night away, and I had to get up early to pack, and then Floo down to London just to take a train back north again, which is just _stupid_ –"

At this, Professor Sinistra grimaced sympathetically. "Yes, it is," she said. "Not our idea; Ministry requirement. Heaven knows why…"

"A legacy of the Stuart succession, originally," Professor Binns volunteered. "After James I claimed the English throne in 1603, the English wizarding community, alarmed at the preponderance of Scottish influence in their affairs, began to seek formal recognition for London as the centre of magical life in Britain. This entailed, firstly, the concentration of the city's extensive mercantile population in the area we now know as the Alleys, and subsequently…" He paused, catching Professor Sinistra's censorious eye, and coughed. "Ah. H'm. Yes. Well. You were saying, Miss MacPherson?"

Morag sighed. "Nothing," she said. "Just that I was already tired by the time I got here, and then the Sorting and the feast and dealing with all those creeps from the Dark families just made it worse – and then we finally had lights-out, but I couldn't get comfortable in that rock-hard bed they gave me, and I was just coming back out to the common room to try and find a house-elf to fetch me some cocoa or something… and then _this_ went and happened," she finished, waving her arms helplessly to indicate the entirety of her surroundings. "So of course I'm having the temper of a troll, because I always do when I'm tired and upset and… and everything. But I do have manners, Professor, really," she said earnestly. "I may not be remembering them well right now, but I can mind them if I try. Honest goblin."

The corners of Professor Sinistra's mouth quirked upward, and she and Professor Burbage exchanged a glance. "Come here, Miss MacDougal," the latter said, straightening her robes and patting her thigh invitingly.

Morag obediently rolled off her cushion and crawled over to the Muggle Studies mistress, who took her in her arms and rested her on her lap; she leaned against her bosom, shut her eyes, and let out a little sigh that somehow didn't sound quite as aggrieved as she presumably wanted it to. Professor Burbage smiled, and gestured to Sally-Anne to continue.

Sally-Anne started; with all this talk of manners and long days and 17th-Century Muggle kings, she'd almost forgotten about the _Iliad_. Hastily, she glanced down at the book again, her lips moving silently as she searched for the place where she'd left off. Chryses, that was it.

" **Now Chryses had come to the ships of the Achaeans to free his daughter,** " she read, " **and had brought with him a great ransom. Moreover, he bore in his hand the scepter of Apollo wreathed with a suppliant's wreath, and he besought the Achaeans – but most of all the two sons of Atreus, who were their chiefs.** "

"Two sons?" said Calum. "This King Agamemnon had a brother, then?"

Professor Sinistra glanced enquiringly at Professor Burbage, who frowned. "Yes, evidently," she said. "And I'm sure I'll recognise his name as soon as Miss Perks reads it, but just now I'm drawing a complete blank." She let out a sheepish little laugh. "Shameful of me, I know, but it's been a while since I spent much time with the Homeric epics. I wish I'd known this afternoon that they'd be looming so large in a few hours; perhaps I could have brushed up a bit."

"Well, never mind that now," said Mandy. "Come on, Sally-Anne, I want to hear what Agamemnon did to this fellow that made Apollo so mad."

"I want to know what Chryses was freeing his daughter from," Morag murmured. "If Apollo's so powerful, who'd have the nerve to take his priest's daughter prisoner?"

"Maybe the Achaeans had some bigger god on their side," said Calum. "Like that Zeus, or somebody. Or maybe they just didn't believe in gods at all; there's a bloke in my neighbourhood back home who…"

"How about we just _read and find out_?" said Mandy, sounding a little testy.

And Sally-Anne, who was inclined to agree, didn't even wait for the others to concur before resuming her lection. " **'Sons of Atreus,' he cried,** " she said, " **'and all other Achaeans, may the gods who dwell in Olympus grant you to sack the city of Priam and to reach your homes in safety; but free my daughter and accept a ransom for her, in reverence to Apollo, son of Zeus.'** " Coming to the end of the paragraph, she inhaled quickly and resumed, " **On this the rest of the Achaeans with one voice were for respecting the priest and taking the ransom that he offered; but not so Agamemnon, who spoke fiercely to him and sent him roughly away.** "

"Uh-oh," said Calum.

Sally-Anne nodded, and continued. " **'Old man,' said he, 'let me not find you tarrying about our ships, nor yet coming hereafter. Your sceptre of the god and your wreath shall profit you nothing. I will not free her. She shall grow old in my house at Argos far from her own home, busying herself with my loom and visiting my couch. So go, and do not provoke me or it shall be the worse for you.'** "

"What a git," said Mandy with decision.

Morag, meanwhile, glanced up at Professor Burbage nervously. "Does _visiting his couch_ mean what I think it does, Professor?" she said.

Professor Burbage sighed. "Yes, I'm afraid so, dear," she said.

Morag shuddered. "I don't think I'm liking the ancient Greek Muggles," she said.

"That's the thing Zeus did?" said Calum. "So Chryses's daughter isn't going to be Agamemnon's wife, either?"

"I should hope not," said Professor Sinistra. "I don't know what your own plans for marriage are, Mr Moon, but if they involve treating your wife as a homeless, captive servant, then I'll know what to do about it, whether I'm still alive or no."

Professor Burbage laughed softly. "Not to worry, Gudrun," she said. "Agamemnon's real wife wasn't anywhere near so hapless."

"Glad to hear it," said Professor Sinistra. "Come, Miss Perks, let's hear what Apollo did to this louse of a king of men. I feel sorry for the men, I don't mind saying."

Sally-Anne giggled. "Yes, ma'am," she said. "Um, let's see… what part did I read last?"

"Agamemnon told the priest not to provoke him," said Mandy.

"Oh, right." Sally-Anne cleared her throat. " **The old man feared him and obeyed. Not a word he spoke, but went by the shore of the sounding sea and prayed apart to King Apollo whom lovely Leto had borne. 'Hear me,' he cried, 'O god of the silver bow, that protectest Chryse and holy Cilla and rulest Tenedos with thy might, hear me, O thou of Sminthe!' –** Did I get all those names right, Professor?"

"And what are they the names of, anyway?" said Calum. "Places, it sounds like, but what's important about them?"

There was a moment's awkward silence. "Haven't the foggiest, I'm afraid," said Professor Burbage. "Of course, it makes sense that certain cities and regions should have been put particularly under Apollo's protection, but the only one I actually know anything about is Delphi, where the Oracle was kept. I guess we'll have to do some research tomorrow; I know that my predecessor left some old classical texts behind when he went back to America." She laughed. "I'm sorry, I'm really being quite useless tonight, aren't I?"

"No," said Morag.

Professor Burbage glanced down at her, and gave her hair a gentle stroke. "Anyway, Miss Perks," she said, "it does sound to me as though you made all the names sound suitably Greek. In fact, if I may say so, I think you're doing quite remarkably well with that, under the circumstances."

Sally-Anne beamed. "Thanks, Professor."

Professor Burbage smiled back, and waved a hand. " _Continuez, mon enfant._ "

Sally-Anne wondered why she was speaking French all of a sudden, but pigeonholed that for another time; she didn't know how much longer the section was that she had to read, and she didn't want to spend a month's worth of consciousness in this Come-and-Go Room any more than Morag did. " **'If I have ever decked your temple with garlands,'** " she read, " **'or burned your thighbones in fat of bulls or goats, grant my prayer and let** … **'** "

"Hang on," said Calum. "What was that about him burning Apollo's thighbones? That doesn't sound very pious of him."

"Not the thighbones in Apollo's own body," Professor Burbage hastened to clarify. "The thighbones of sacrificial animals that Chryses had offered to him."

"Then why didn't he say 'burned thighbones for you' or something?"

"I don't know," said Professor Burbage, seeming far less concerned about this display of ignorance than she had about the last two. "But he didn't. Miss Perks?"

 _Some of the grownups want to get back to bed, too,_ Sally-Anne thought with amusement. " **'** … **and let your arrows avenge these my prayers upon the Danaans,'** " she read. (The Danaans were Agamemnon and his men, she supposed; she was relieved that nobody interrupted to raise the question.) " **Thus did he pray, and Apollo heard his prayer. He came down furious from the summits of Olympus, with his bow and his quiver upon his shoulder, and the arrows rattled on his back with the rage that trembled within him. He set himself down away from the** …"

Morag stirred, and cleared her throat. "Excuse me?" she said.

All eyes turned to her in slight surprise. "Yes, Miss MacDougal?" said Professor Sinistra.

"Probably it's not important," said Morag, "but, the way they're talking about those arrows, I've a feeling he'll be using them soon. So I was just thinking I should find out: are they really arrows, or something else?"

Mandy blinked. "How could they be something else?" she said. "It _says_ they're arrows, doesn't it? Why would Homer lie about that?"

"I'm not meaning he would," said Morag impatiently. "But the Professor said that Zeus's will meant the consequences of doing wrong, so I thought his son's arrows might mean conscience or something. Isn't that fair?"

Professor Burbage laughed. "You know, Miss MacDougal, you're quite a clever little girl," she said. "Actually, since Apollo was the god of the sun, his shafts usually mean its rays in later poems. But of course Homer could also mean literal arrows, since he lived in a time when the gods were imagined literally as well as symbolically. So why don't we listen, and see which makes more sense?"

Morag shrugged. "That's fine," she said. "I just wanted to know what all it _might_ be."

"Quite sensible," Professor Burbage agreed. "All right, Miss Perks, carry on."

" **He set himself down away from the ships,** " read Sally-Anne, " **with a face as dark as night, and his silver bow rang death as he shot his arrow in the midst of them. First he smote their mules and their hounds, but presently he aimed his shafts at the people themselves, and all day long the pyres of the dead were burning.** "

She was about to ask whether the others thought that meant sunbeams or regular arrows (and also, while she was at it, what a "pyre" was); as it turned out, however, she didn't get the chance. As soon as she had finished speaking the word "burning", the others, and the books, and the whole Come-and-Go Room abruptly vanished, and she found herself once again curled up in her bed in the Hufflepuff girls' dormitory.

* * *

For a moment, the sudden surprise left her utterly motionless, and she briefly wondered whether the whole thing had been a dream. It didn't feel like one in her memory, but that was what suddenly finding herself in bed when she'd thought she was far away usually meant – though, of course, what happened at Hogwarts couldn't really be judged by what was usual elsewhere.

After a little thought, she decided that it wasn't important just then. She could always find one of the others tomorrow morning, and ask him whether it had been real – or, actually, she could just go and find out if the real professors of Astronomy, Muggle Studies, and History of Magic were the same as the ones she imagined having seen in the Room. (In fact, if her memory served, she had a History of Magic class directly after breakfast; if she got to the classroom and found an elderly ghost named Binns in front of the blackboard, that would be all the proof she would need.) Right now, it was time to try and get some sleep – though how she was supposed to do that, with her first day at Hogwarts having turned out so much more eventful than even she had ever dreamed, was more than she knew.

But Nature will out, especially at age eleven. After a few more minutes of tossing and turning, Sally-Anne abruptly tumbled into a deep, peaceful slumber, and spent the rest of the night dreaming of parchment airplanes made of sunbeams.


End file.
